Oxford's Word of the Year is Perfect After the Year We've Had

View of the Oxford American College dictionary taken in Washington on November 16, 2009. The New Oxford American Dictionary named "unfriend" -- as in deleting someone as a friend on a social network such as Facebook -- its word of the year on Monday. Oxford University Press USA, in a blog post, said "unfriend," a verb, had bested netbook, sexting, paywall, birther and death panel for the honor. "Unfriend has real lex-appeal," said Christine Lindberg, senior lexicographer for Oxford?s US dictionary program. AFP PHOTO/Nicholas KAMM (Photo credit should read NICHOLAS KAMM/AFP/Getty Images)

While the dictionary's choice does not always reflect an increase in the particular word's use, this year it does. Oxford Dictionaries says usage of "post-truth" increased by 2,000 percent in 2016 when compared to last year—and after the year we've had, it's easy to see why.

"Post-truth" is defined as "relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief." The dictionary noticed the first spike in the use of the word in June, after the contentious “Brexit” referendum. A second spike came in July, after president-elect Donald Trump secured the Republican presidential nomination, the dictionary says.

"Fueled by the rise of social media as a news source and a growing distrust of facts offered up by the establishment, post-truth as a concept has been finding its linguistic footing for some time," Oxford Dictionaries' president Casper Grathwohl said in a statement. "Given that usage of the term hasn't shown any signs of slowing down, I wouldn't be surprised if post-truth becomes one of the defining words of our time."

"Post-truth' beat out other popular contenders, including "adulting," "alt-right," and "Brexiteer."